by no means a crack sailor. His ship was too
slovenly for them, he did not flog enough.
The story of the Barfleur is one of the old
Plymouth traditions, and recals bitter days,
when Tartar captains tortured their men to
madness by small oppression. A new captain
appointed to the Barfleur so tormented his
men that they signed a round robin, and sent
it to the Admiralty, who instantly forwarded
it to the commander-in-chief at the port. The
Tartar, holding the round robin in his hand,
mustered the men.

"What have you get to say against me?"
he said. "What complaint have you? Come,
I command you to tell me."

Several of the men replied, "Nothing, sir;"
but one honest fellow stood out and said, "If
you want me to tell the truth, sir, I was once
punished wrongfully under your orders—I was
innocent of the charge."

The captain shouted at once, "Put that man
in irons!" Four other sailors, indignant at
this, stood out, and declared that they also
had been unjustly punished. Two more were
then put in irons, and a court-martial was
appointed.

When the day came the irons were taken off
the men, and officers and guards being
appointed, proceeded the shortest way to the
flag-ship. The sea was high and the boat upset
at "the bridge," as it was called, a line of
sunken rocks connecting Drake's Island with
the mainland. A few men of the boat's crew
were saved, and one prisoner. The president of
the court-martial wished to postpone the trial,
but the solitary prisoner claimed immediate
justice, and was acquitted. The captain, savage
as a wounded tiger, resolved to have his revenge.
More brutal than ever, he now became thirsty
for cruelty. He flogged a whole watch, because
they did not secure the sails within an
impossible time. At last, at Lisbon, a man more
passionate than the rest, stabbed the wretch,
but the point of the knife turned on a rib, the
captain escaped, and the sailor was hung. With
his dying breath the man declared, that he had
willingly devoted himself to death, for the sake
of his messmates. The captain died soon
afterwards of apoplexy.

The Africaine was another unhappy ship.
A mutinous spirit had broken out, and the
men threatened to rise if Corbet, an arbitrary
man they dreaded, was appointed. The port-
admiral had determined, if a mutiny actually
broke out, to lay a frigate on each side of the
Africaine, and instantly sink her. This same
Captain Corbet, who was afterwards killed off
the Isle of France, once said at the admiral's
table that the service would never be worth
anything till captains could flog every one in
the ship, even to the lieutenants.

"When that time comes," said good-natured
Sir Edward Buller, "admirals will flog captains,
and I'll give you your full share if ever you
come under my hands."

Admiral Young, the port-admiral then, was a
cold, formal, erect man, thin, grave, one hand
always on the handle of his sword, the other
hanging stiffly by his side. His costume was
always the same—white kerseymere breeches,
black top boots reaching to his knees, and squared
hat. He was succeeded by Sir Robert Calder,
a bluff, good humoured, stout man, who used
to boast, that when nearly sixty years of age he
had dived under a fifty-gun ship. His neglect
in destroying the French after Trafalgar was
attributed to his Scotch cautiousness. He had
attacked twenty-seven Frenchmen with fifteen
English vessels, and captured two, but he did
not follow up the victory, because twelve or
thirteen sail of the line were momentarily
expected out of Corunna to join the enemy.

In 1809, the military hospital was full of the
wreck of Sir John Moore's army, from Corunna.
The soldiers, mere helpless skeletons, were to be
seen supported to the hospital by the kind and
hearty sailors. Most of the badly wounded
had been left behind. When the French field
pieces began to fire on our transports, they cut
their cables and began to run, till our vessels
reassured them by some sweeping broadsides
on the French, who instantly fled.

The same year the survivors of the miserable
Walcheren expedition arrived, to share the same
hospital. Eleven thousand men had fallen ill
out of a fine army of thirty thousand. Many
fell sick after leaving the Scheldt. Gaunt spectres
of men tottered between the rows of beds;
others, still weaker, lounged on their beds,
attenuated, pale, hovering between life and
death. The medical staff had never heard of
the local fever, and had not taken with them
either bark or wine. Seven thousand brave
men perished owing to this blunder.

There were at this time more than seven
thousand miserable French prisoners in the
depôts of Plymouth garrison. They were
allowed to work (poor pining wretches) at
Dartmoor, and sell the produce of their labour.
Many who had no trade spent their time in
gambling, and played away the very clothes off
their backs. A set of these fellows, who were
almost naked, were called "the Romans." They
had gambled away even their bedding, and slept
on the prison floor, huddled together for warmth.
The story was that they used to turn sides at
night, at the word of command—"Turn one,
turn all." There is a tradition of the war time,
how two poor Frenchmen, escaping from the
San Rafael, swam to a lighter full of powder,
overpowered the man on board, ran down
through all the ships in Hamoaze, round
Drake's Island, and so across the channel,
and sold the powder in France for some hundreds
of pounds. The old resident, remembers,
too, how a prisoner on board the San Rafael
imitated a two-pound note with Indian ink, and
was sent to Exeter and tried for forgery. The
defence was, that he was under the protection
of no laws, and had therefore not broken any.
He was acquitted.

The press-gangs were the great disgrace and
terror of Plymouth in the war times. Our seamen
were hunted down like wild beasts, without
a chance of redress. Husbands, fathers,
brothers, and lovers were torn suddenly from those